South Korean trade officials visited the Port of Stockton this week for a get-to-know-you meeting. They laid the groundwork for increased trade.

The port is reason number one that Stockton is unlike anyplace else. Even other Valley cities. Modesto may have a lot going for it, but not trade with South Korea.

"We are actually looking at trading agriculture products you guys have," said Karen Kim with the Korean Trade-Investment Promotion Agency office in San Jose. "The famous ones would be nuts and wine. Even pomegranates,"

"On our end," Kim said, "we would like to sell you some auto parts and computer parts. That's the industry we specialize in."

It is simply wrong to think of Stockton solely as a farm town hunkered in the Central Valley. It has a farm-town side. But Stockton also is a Pacific Rim city with pan-Pacific influences.

Throughout Stockton's history, in fact, it has been linked to distant and seemingly unrelated rim cities by a maritime web of commerce and immigration.

At one time, Stockton boasted the biggest population of Filipinos outside Manila.

Valley grain was shipped to Australia during its 19th century boom. Chilean grain merchants, distressed by the competition, tried to buy up San Francisco grain mills.

To Chinese gold seekers, Stockton was Samfow, or third city, after San Francisco and Sacramento.

"The first people to get here for the Gold Rush were from China, Australia, Chile - not the East Coast. It took them a year to get here," said Dennis Flynn, an economics professor at University of the Pacific and expert in Pacific trade.

"Water is the freeway, the superhighway, not a barrier," Flynn said. He argues that the very notion of a Western United States economy is doubtful. It's a Pacific economy.

If China sniffles, the Port of Stockton sneezes.

If Stocktonians do not fully appreciate this, it is thanks in part to Osama bin Laden.

Before 9/11, the general public could drive onto the docks, jaw with longshoremen, even brazen up the gangway and ask to see a ship's captain.

But the Department of Homeland Security restricted access.

That's a great loss. If only because Stocktonians, being somewhat removed from the port, don't hear the counter-narrative to all the bad news about recession, municipal bankruptcy and crime.

Many believe the city is completely down in the dumps. But the port, which sits within city limits, is booming.

"We see actually extreme potential in growth," Aschieris said.

In the last five years, the private sector has invested 1.8 billion in port projects. An additional $1.5 billion is under negotiation.

Just as the wider world impacts the port, the port impacts Stockton in a variety of ways. Directly, it has created between 1,500-2,000 jobs. These ripple through the city economy.

"It could very well be that somebody working at a grocery store somewhere in Stockton, a portion of their paycheck comes from (port employees) buying things in their store," Aschieris said. "People are dependent on trade."

Another way to put it: just like humans, Stockton is 98 percent water.

While the port is off limits, ship crews from all over the world can disembark and take shore leave in Stockton.

You will never guess their favorite destinations.

"I've heard they enjoy two places," Aschieris said. "They enjoy going to Walmart. And they enjoy going to Victoria's Secret. And that's where they spend their paychecks in Stockton."

It makes sense. Sailors need stuff; and a present to give the wife upon returning home. It gets lonely at sea.